It might be an adventure race featuring some of the most beautiful trails in the world, but the Tarawera Ultramarathon race could, in future, also feature the streets of Rotorua.
Race organiser Paul Charteris and race director Tim Day have just returned from Europe, bringing back with them ideas about how to make the event bigger. They were at the UTMB, the French race in the Ultra-Trail World Tour.
''This is our sister race, the Ultra-Trail du Mont Blanc. There are 55km, 100km, 120km and 170km races,'' Charteris said.
''There are a few reasons to go. We were advertising the Tarawera Ultra Marathon and the (Tarawera) Trail Marathon and 50k to a global audience. There were about 50,000 people at the race and that's a really, really huge audience for us to be in front of.''
Charteris said there were several ideas that could be incorporated into the Rotorua event, most significantly, bringing the race into the heart of town.